"Hey Woo!", San greets me as soon as I've closed the door behind me.
Woo. He's called me that quite often in the last few days. And I like it. A lot.
But I still try to act nonchalantly about it, like it's not big deal for me, as I make my way to our kitchen table to dump the groceries I've just bought. San is sitting on our sofa, surrounded by his laptop and a few notes, looking at me expectantly.
"Hey, Sannie." The nickname makes it past my lips before I can think about it.
A second later, I already wish I could take it back. I've never called San a nickname before – at least not one that I meant seriously. But San doesn't complain. Instead, he smiles at me – and the possible meaning of the fact that he calls his friends out on calling him Sannie, but apparently doesn't mind me doing it anymore has my heart skipping a beat.
"Did you get everything from the list?" San throws one of those peppermint drops in his mouth – he became weirdly addicted to them in the last few days.
"Yeah. Did you manage to finish your analysis of that Bollywood song?"
San coughs awkwardly and shuts his laptop before I can step around the table to get a look at the screen. "Not really. I did some, uh, research on it though... But I think I'll be done before Sunday."
"That sucks." He's been spending hours on his homework already.
Which is also the reason why I went grocery shopping on my own instead of us going together: contrary to San, I'm mostly finished with my stuff. Okay, and maybe I'm also really good at ignoring the pile of books and essays on my desk that I still need to read. But reading doesn't matter that much anyway.
The last important homework that I really need to do is to meet up with Yeosang in half an hour to develop a choreo about waves for our Choreographies class. I kinda regret partnering up with him for this damn mini-project now – but how could I have known that he'd be so furious with me because of the way I've ended things with Jimin?
"It's alright – I'll manage", San absentmindedly replies. "Although I do think I could use a break now. Let's sort through this grocery stuff and put it in the fridge or wherever."
"Sure." I throw him the new pack of peppermint drops I bought for him. "Here goes your addiction."
San rolls his eyes at that. "I'm not addicted." There's a playful smile tugging at the corners of his lips. "I just feel like I can concentrate better when I've got something to suck on."
For a moment, I freeze to stare at him. There's no way in hell he meant it like this. He is a fucking virgin, after all – he's fucking innocent. Isn't he?
He didn't word it like that on purpose, I try to convince myself, no way. He probably doesn't even know what he was implying... Though I still need to gulp and avert my gaze when San pops another one of those damn drops into his mouth.
"So..." Standing up, San scans the grocery articles - and frowns. "What do we need lettuce for?"
"Lettuce?" It takes me a bit to get from his reference to blowjobs back to our new groceries. I let my gaze wander over the table until I spot the cabbage-
Damn it, this isn't cabbage.
"Okay, so." I run a hand through my hair. This is fucking embarrassing.
When I was living alone, at least no one else but me took notice of my grocery shopping failures. Like that one time when I had bought cream instead of milk: nobody cared, except for me. "I guess I might or might not have kind of... um... taken the cabbage for lettuce. Unintentionally."
San's eyes widen. "How the fuck do you confuse cabbage with lettuce?!" Not even two seconds later, however, he starts shaking with laughter.
Despite the embarrassment I find myself smiling as well – because there haven't been many times I've seen San this carefree... and as his laughter becomes a mixture of laugh and giggles, I realize that I also really like the way it sounds: it's joyful and warm and comforting-
The sudden weight of San's hand coming down on my shoulder snaps me out of my stupid thoughts.
San squeezes my shoulder, still giggling. "I can't believe this, Woo. I mean, I kinda remember that you told me about how you sometimes buy the wrong food – but honestly, I didn't think it'd be that bad..." The slightest of smiles grazes his face, just barely showcasing his dimples, as he squeezes my shoulder once again while boring his fingertips into the muscles at the back of my neck.
"I think next time I should maybe do the grocery shopping..."
When our eyes meet again, San is chewing on his bottom lip. His face is suddenly very close - I can even smell the light peppermint in the air between us.
"But I do trust you with everything else", San adds quietly, the tiniest of smiles flashing over his face. More than anything else though, he looks nervous. "I trust you", he tells me – and I freeze.
Of course I remember the last time San and I talked about trust: it wasn't even a week ago, and it also happened to be one of those few times that we actually talked about hookups.
'I'd only ever sleep with someone I trust', he had said.
So... does that mean San would sleep with me if I'd want it too?
Do I want it? Hell, yeah. But at the same time, I can feel my heart beating against my ribs, too wildly, too fast – I'm scared.
Why? It's not like I've never done this before – honestly, I've lost count of with how many guys I've hooked up until now, how many I've fucked. There were so many.
And it was almost always pretty good and hot, and I've gotten tons of experience from it.
I'm not the virgin here – San is. So why am I the one who's frozen, unable to form a full sentence, overthinking everything?
San's thumb brushes over my collarbone.
And pauses there.
On my skin.
My stomach is lurching, I feel like I'm falling, I can't think straight. It's just like that one time when I fell out of a tree: the air was whooshing around me, I was falling, and I should've known that there would be something like an impact one and a half meters below; one that would knock the air out of my lungs.
But I didn't know. I couldn't wrap my head around it, couldn't even fully comprehend that I was, at that moment, in this weird state of falling – falling helplessly.
Now I know what it means though: it means inevitably hitting the ground.
I don't know where exactly I am right now - but that dizzy, lightheaded feeling cursing through my veins must mean that I haven't hit the ground yet.
San's eyes are staring into mine, dark brown and unreadable. We both know that something is up. But San seems to be the only one to know what exactly it is.
His hand is lying heavy and warm on my shoulder. It's only when his grip tightens and he starts leaning almost imperceptibly closer – I would've missed it for sure, if it wasn't for the fact that all of my attention is lying on him and the little space between us...
It's only then that I think I'm starting to get what falling might mean too.
Which has me freaking out.
"I need to get going." Shaking San's hand off, I stumble a few steps back – which brings burning embarrassment flaring up in my cheeks because I'm a dancer, I don't fucking stumble. My attempt to take a deep breath is to no avail – I might be falling, but the air's already been knocked out of my lungs. "Yeosang's gonna be mad if I'm late, so I really need to get going." With waves of embarrassment and confusion crashing down on me, I speed-walk out of the kitchen and into the comfort-zone that is my room to pack my stuff – I've already forgotten what I need to pack for in the first place. My thoughts are a mess.
What the hell did just happen? Did San-
Did San, just a moment ago, really want to kiss me?